OP-ED | Beware The Devil You Don’t Know

In most places, the summers are slim pickins’ for state political junkies. And truth be told, except for the lively mayor’s race in Hartford, it’s pretty slow here in Connecticut as well — even with the party conventions, caucuses, and primaries.

But sometimes the summers are politically notable for what happened once upon a time and the lessons that can be learned. And 15 years ago last weekend, a political nomination set the stage for one of the most spectacular and disgraceful collapses in Connecticut political history. No, I’m not talking about former Gov. John G. Rowland. Johnny was a saint compared to Philip Giordano, the former mayor of Rowland’s hometown of Waterbury.

In July 2000, Giordano reached the apex of his miserable career when he accepted the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate at the party convention at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield. When the event was over, Giordano was armed with a unanimous endorsement and was set to mount an underdog challenge to two-term incumbent Joe Lieberman. But something was strange about Giordano’s quest from the get-go.

Rowland did not attend the convention to endorse Giordano in person, insisting through state Republican Party Chairman Chris DePino that he and his family had already planned a mini-vacation that weekend. Asked earlier why Giordano would make a good senator, Rowland told a reporter, “I’ll let Mr. Giordano answer that.” That left the speaking duties at the convention to Lt. Gov. Jodi Rell, who gave a brief speech at the podium but would not appear on the stage with Giordano.

No one knew it at the time, but Lieberman was about to be tapped by Democratic presidential nominee Al Gore to be his running mate. Lieberman failed in his bid to become vice president but he trounced Giordano in the Senate race with 64 percent of the vote. As as much as I detest Lieberman as a politician, it’s now clear he did us all a favor by wiping up the floor with Waterbury’s despicable mayor.

About a year later, I was vacationing on Lake George and fiddling with the car radio when I heard the news that Giordano had been arrested by the FBI. Like everyone else who was familiar with graft and corruption in the Brass City — who could forget T. Frank Hayes, Mike Bergin and Joe Santopietro — I immediately assumed the feds had nabbed Giordano for taking payola.

Indeed, the FBI was probing City Hall for corruption. Agents had bugged the building and were eavesdropping on Giordano’s own office. But they soon became so horrified by what they had discovered that they essentially blew the cover on their own graft investigation.

Since raping little girls isn’t a federal crime, prosecutors brought him up on communications and civil rights charges. As Giordano continues to rot in a federal prison in Illinois while serving a 37-year sentence, he could not resist giving taxpayers a gift on the 14th anniversary of his conviction. The pale, gaunt, balding now-52-year-old Giordano appeared before a federal judge in Bridgeport complaining of inadequate legal representation and seeking a reduction of his sentence. What a joke. A man who stole the innocence of prepubescent girls wants his freedom back. Considering the astronomically high rate of recidivism on the part of pedophiles, I’d say 37 years is a stroll in the park.

But the whole sordid episode also has a personal significance for me. I was so appalled by Lieberman’s double-dealing in running for both vice president and senator at the same time that I wound up voting for Giordano.

I should have seen the proverbial handwriting on the wall. Giordano looked like a lonely man at that convention, perhaps because word of the federal corruption investigation had already leaked out to the powers-that-be. He was the skunk at his own garden party. If nothing else, the political lesson of the Giordano affair is an old one: better the devil you know than the devil you don’t.

Contributing op-ed columnist Terry Cowgill lives in Lakeville, blogs at ctdevilsadvocate.com and is news editor of The Berkshire Record in Great Barrington, Mass. Follow him on Twitter @terrycowgill.

DISCLAIMER: The views, opinions, positions, or strategies expressed by the author are theirs alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or positions of CTNewsJunkie.com.

Comments

(8) Archived Comments

posted by: Greg | July 31, 2015 9:11am

And we all wondered why Filthy Phil wasn’t at the Waterbury High Schools’ National Honor Society events that year…

I was taking a Business Law class the semester of his Federal trial and one of our assignments was to sit in on a court case of our choosing and write about it. What better than Filthy Phil’s? The lead FBI agent was on the stand and they were playing wiretaps of Phil’s phone…nothing short of nauseating.

Nothing good ever came out of Waterbury.

posted by: ACR | July 31, 2015 9:27am

Upon introducing me to Giordano in 1996 a then sitting state senator quickly came up with someplace “we” needed to be and dragged me off.

I asked him what that was about to which he replied: “I dunno, there’s just something about that guy that gives me the creeps”

posted by: osemasterofdoom | July 31, 2015 3:02pm

Re: detesting Lieberman: isn’t it fascinating how when a politician reaches “across the aisle” from THEIR side to YOUR side, he’s a statesman, but when one reaches from YOUR side to THEIR side, he’s a turncoat? And that’s true of Republicans and Democrats. Ben Franklin would have loved this one.

posted by: art vandelay | August 2, 2015 11:09am

@ARC
Years ago I attended an event at the Ponte Club in Waterbury. Giordanio came in with his entourage to press the flesh. He was running for the Senate.
Never met the guy but there was about him didn’t like especially that tailored silk suit. I felt I was shaking hands with Lucky Luciano’s son.

posted by: ACR | August 2, 2015 11:06pm

>>I felt I was shaking hands with Lucky Luciano’s son.

I actually met Lucky Luciano’s son, though I didn’t know it at the time.
Giordano had a higher slime factor; not that Lucky’s boy was any prize.

posted by: art vandelay | August 3, 2015 5:18pm

According to Wikipedia, Lucky Luciano never LEGALLY married and bore no children. He did exchange rings however. Luciano did not want any offspring going through the “hell” Thomas Dewey put him through. Stating “shaking hands with John Gotti’s son” would have been a better historical analogy. I think everyone got my point however.

posted by: art vandelay | August 3, 2015 6:23pm

@Greg,
One thing did come out of Waterbury. Rosalind Russell. Waterbury in their short sightedness NEVER even named a street after her. They did however did name one for someone who NEVER set foot in Waterbury. Martin Luther King. Waterbury isn’t alone. Hamden never bothered to name a street after its most famous citizen, Ernest Borgnine.

posted by: ACR | August 3, 2015 11:29pm

Lucky Luciano had a son who last I knew was in witnessed protection.
Hair trigger anger issues, heaven only knows what he got himself in the middle of.
He was a rather clueless partner in a body-shop & used car operation when I met him about 20 years ago.
His partner was thrilled when he sold his half and disappeared.
About 4 years later the partner told me who he was; the partner was pretty sure about it to boot.

I never heard anything bad about John Gotti from anyone that knew him.